Thom S. Rainer's Blog, page 184

What to Do with an Anonymous Letter

Throw it away.
Disregard the message.
Pray for the author.
Pray that God will take your focus off of it.
Move on.

That is all.

10 Reasons Church Revitalizations Often Fail – Rainer on Leadership #360

Podcast Episode #360

SUBSCRIBE: iTunes • RSS • Stitcher • TuneIn Radio • Google Play

Church revitalization, like several other things in the church, is not easy. There are no magic bullets, and because it’s hard, church revitalization often fails. Today, we cover ten reasons why.

Some highlights from today’s episode include:

Church members are often accepting of the idea of change—just not the action of change.
A lot of churches could do better in revitalization if they just knew how.
Church programs should be seen as means, not ends.
Church programs are not solutions. They are tools.
There is no magic bullet for church revitalization.
We know magic bullets don’t exist, but we still seek them out.
Reaching people with the gospel engenders spiritual warfare.

The 10 reasons church revitalizations often fail are:

Comfort/resistance to change.


Lack of knowledge.


Despair and defeatism.


Perception that programs are ends instead of a means.


The magic bullet syndrome.


Lack of awareness about the community.


Evangelistic apathy.


Deflection of blame.


Short-term leadership.


Failure to consider being acquired by another church.


Episode Sponsors

Vanderbloemen Search Group is the premier pastor search firm dedicated to helping churches and ministries build great teams. Their Fall Lead Pastor and Executive Pastor Coaching Networks are now open for registration, and our very own Dr. Rainer will be speaking at the Fall Lead Pastor Coaching Network.

So if you’re a Lead Pastor or an Executive Pastor looking for peer roundtable coaching, check it out at vanderbloemen.com/coaching. It’s limited to 16 folks, so apply today before it fills up.

Midwestern Seminary, one of the fastest growing seminaries in North America, exists to train leaders For The Church. The local church is God’s “Plan A” for the proclamation of the gospel, and there is no Plan B. And this is Midwestern’s vision and heartbeat—equipping pastors and other ministry leaders who are called to expand God’s mission in the world through the local church. At Midwestern Seminary: they train leaders ‘For The Church.’

Visit them online at MBTS.edu and start your ministry training today.

Feedback

If you have a question you would like answered on the show, fill out the form on the podcast page here at ThomRainer.com. If we use your question, you’ll receive a free copy of Who Moved My Pulpit?

Resources Mentioned in Today’s Podcast

EvangelismRenewal.com
ChurchAnswers.com
Technicolor
Seven Reasons Church Acquisitions Are Critical for the Future – Rainer on Leadership #359

Ten Unfair Expectations of Pastors’ Wives

The pastor’s wife in many churches carries heavy burdens.

Sometimes they are impossible expectations.

To be fair, this post could refer to any church staff person, male or female, so it could be called ministers’ spouses. For simplicity, and because I primarily hear from this group of people, I refer to them as pastors’ wives.

So what are some of these unfair expectations? Here are the top ten expectations imposed upon these ladies.

“I am expected to attend every function at the church.” One wife told us that church members resent it when she is seen doing anything outside the church.
“Many church members expect me to know everything that is happening in the church.” In other words, they should know everything their pastor/husband knows.
“We have several church members who feel free to complain to me about my husband.” So her church has several members who are lacking in emotional intelligence.
“Church members utilize me as a de facto assistant to my husband, giving me messages for him.” One wife shared with us that she received eleven messages to give to her husband after a specific worship service.
“I am still amazed how many church members expect me to function as an employee of the church.” Some are expected to lead music or play piano. Others are expected to act in a specific ministry employee role such as student or children’s director.
“Some of the members expect our children to be perfect and act perfect.” One wife explained that she and her husband were new to a church when a church member confronted them about their misbehaving children. Their outlandish sin was running in the church after a worship service.
“I am always supposed to be perfectly made up and dressed when I leave the house.” A church member expressed her dismay to a pastor’s wife who ran into a grocery store without makeup. You can’t make this stuff up.
“I have no freedom at our church to be anything but perfectly emotionally composed.” This story really got to me. A deacon chastised a pastor’s wife for shedding tears at church four days after her dad died.
“I think some of our church members expect my family to take a vow of poverty.” She was specifically referring to the criticism she received for purchasing a six-year-old minivan after her third child was born.
“So many church members expect me to be their best friend.” And obviously a pastor’s wife can’t be the best friend to everyone, so she disappoints or angers others.

These are some of the comments we have received at this blog over the years from pastors’ wives. And it seems as though these trials are more gender biased. For example, the husband of a children’s minister commented that he rarely has the pressure and expectations that he sees imposed upon female spouses.

But more than other staff positions, the pastor is naturally the focus of attention and, often, criticism.

And the pastor’s family, by extension, becomes the focus of unfair and unreasonable expectations.

Pray for Redeemer Church

Location: Tomball, Texas

Pastor: Jeff Medders

Weekly Worship: 8:30, 10:00, & 11:30 AM, Central

Fast Facts: Following Hurricane Harvey’s devastating effects on South Texas and the Houston area last weekend, Pastor Medders and volunteers from Redeemer have been working nonstop on relief efforts. Earlier this week they were busy rescuing trapped residents in the Houston area on boats and patrolling with constables to search for looters and thieves. Later in the week, they began distributing supplies and relief aid to those in the Houston area. The relief effort at Redeemer and other churches in Texas will continue over the next several months. Please be in prayer for Redeemer and all churches affected by Hurricane Harvey.

If you or your church wish to donate to the Send Relief efforts to support relief work in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, you can do so here. 100% of donations go directly to relief efforts.

Website: MakingMuchOfJesus.org

“Pray for . . .” is the Sunday blog series at ThomRainer.com. We encourage you to pray for these churches noted every Sunday. Please feel free to comment that you are praying as well.

If you would like to have your church featured in the “Pray for…” series, fill out this information form..

Notable Voices and the Week in Review: September 2, 2017

Earlier this week at ThomRainer.com:

Six Traits of a Church Disrupter
Five Evangelism Realities We Must Face – Rainer on Leadership #358
Seven Traits of the Excellent Ministry Assistant
Popular Google Searches That Lead Readers to ThomRainer.com
Seven Reasons Church Acquisitions Are Critical for the Future – Rainer on Leadership #359

 

3 Reasons Pastors Have Access to Their Church Members’ Giving Records — Art Rainer

Many pastors want to avoid knowing their church members’ giving recordings. There are a few reasons for their avoidance. They don’t want to be perceived as showing favoritism, desiring to spend more time on other ministerial duties, and receiving advice from their peers who recommend avoiding it. But some pastors have a different view. While they understand the reasons why pastors avoid giving records, they feel that reasons to access the records outweigh the reasons for avoiding them. Here are three reasons pastors have access to their church members’ giving records:

 

Renovating Your Church Without Wrecking Your Ministry — Chris Hefner

Our church just completed a sanctuary renovation in the spring. The renovation updated our sanctuary significantly and created more stage space so our contemporary service could worship in our sanctuary (we had been meeting in our fellowship hall). We were also able to add effective seating by transitioning from pews to worship seating. We are grateful that the project is completed and have benefited from worshiping in our renovated sanctuary. These several considerations I trust will save you some headaches as you envision and complete a renovation or new construction.

 

How to Blow Up Your Local Association — Sam Rainer

In our denomination, an association is a group of local churches tied to a specific geographic area. Think of it as a network of churches in one area focused on community-specific needs. Some associations are large and thriving. Ours is neither. We’re the Manatee Association, named after our county, but it’s an apt name. Manatees are gracious and kind animals, but they just tend to float and graze. Sea cows. The locals call them sea cows. Sea cows don’t go anywhere fast. That is our association. But not anymore. We blew up our association. Perhaps that’s not the best phrase. Nothing is destroyed, but I believe everything will be different now.

 

4 Lies that Cause Pastors to Neglect their Families — Jaime Owens

Among young pastors and church planters, there’s no less than a deluge of pressure to give every waking moment to our churches, to the neglect of our families. But brothers, it should never be so. Below I want to offer four lies that can cause young pastors to neglect their families:

 

5 Good Reasons A Church Should Close — Carey Nieuwhof

Once we rediscovered the church’s mission, things began to change dramatically. That’s my wish for every church. But sadly, it doesn’t happen nearly enough. So how do you know the end is near? When should a church close? Here are 5 good reasons a church should throw in the towel and close its doors if it doesn’t want to change.

 

3 Unhealthy Reasons Pastors Talk to Search Teams — Eric Geiger

Some pastors engage in ongoing conversations with pastoral search teams with little to no intention of really considering going to the church they are supposedly considering. They make trips, enjoy dinners, fill out questionnaires, look at homes online, and spend months in conversations just to play the game of going through the process. Some ministry leaders flirt with a church search team with no intention of really even having a date. Why on earth would they do this? What is going on? At least one of three things is at work in the pastor’s heart:

 

Seven Reasons Church Acquisitions Are Critical for the Future – Rainer on Leadership #359

Podcast Episode #359

SUBSCRIBE: iTunes • RSS • Stitcher • TuneIn Radio • Google Play

Churches are dying all over the country. However, their legacy of ministry can live on if the right decisions are made by the leadership. Today we discuss those tough decisions and the reasons churches should be looking to acquire dying churches.

Some highlights from today’s episode include:

Church buildings should be used for ministry and community presence.
If your church is dying, do whatever you can to keep a church presence in your community.
In many communities it’s tough to regain property for churches if one dies and is sold for non-Kingdom use.
If your church is dying, please consider letting a healthy church come in and acquire it.
Churches with an outward focus are healthier than ones with an inward focus.
“The way we’ve always done it” needs to change in dying churches.

The seven reasons we cover in this episode are:

So a church presence in the community will not go away.
Because re-plants have many of the same advantages of typical church plants.
Because real estate is becoming scarce and more expensive.
So the work and ministry of your present church may have a legacy of continuation.
Because the ministry presence in the community will move from unhealthy to healthy.
Because sometimes a new start is needed to overcome negative perceptions in the community.
Because often the acquiring church increases its ministry impact multifold through an acquisition.


Episode Sponsors

The Timothy Track, from Midwestern Seminary, offers select residential M.Div. students placement in internship positions in a local church in the area. Now you can complement your studies with in-the-field ministry experience. In addition, all Timothy Track students will receive up to 12 credit hours for the internship and a 50% tuition scholarship for the first year.

Find out more at mbts.edu/TimothyTrack.

Vanderbloemen Search Group is the premier pastor search firm dedicated to helping churches and ministries build great teams. They’ve helped hundreds of churches just like yours find their church staff and are uniquely geared to help you discern who God is calling to lead your church.

Find out more about Vanderbloemen Search Group by visiting WeStaffTheChurch.com.

Feedback

If you have a question you would like answered on the show, fill out the form on the podcast page here at ThomRainer.com. If we use your question, you’ll receive a free copy of Who Moved My Pulpit?

Resources Mentioned in Today’s Podcast

EvangelismRenewal.com
Church Answers
Autopsy of a Deceased Church
Reclaiming Glory
Multi-site Churches

Popular Google Searches That Lead Readers to ThomRainer.com

By Jonathan Howe

When you have a blog or website that gets as much traffic as ThomRainer.com does on a daily basis, a great deal of the website traffic will come from search engines like Google. People search for random terms (or specific ones) and somehow Google leads them to your website. But thanks to analytics software, it’s easy to find out what people are searching for to find your site.

It is helpful to know what drives interest with readers and can help you know what to write more about as a blogger. Some examples you’d expect for this site are:

Importance of evangelism
Causes of conflict in the church
Qualities of a good pastor
Causes of disunity in the church
Unity in the church
Words to appreciate your pastor
Ten things church members desire in a pastor
Fifteen reasons our churches are less evangelistic today
Hindrances to evangelism

Those are all regular topics here at ThomRainer.com. They should be no surprise to those of you who read this site regularly. We have several posts on each topic.

But then there are other searches.

There are some search terms that I see and wonder “How and why?”

Here is a sampling of this “other” category. If one of these is your search, please explain it in the comment section—because I have questions.

Dating a pastor
Most weird pastors
Tucked or untucked polo shirts?
Introvert jokes
How do I convince an unbeliever the church is not about making money?
Cows in my church
Why does my husband lose it with stupid & cost us our jobs
Falling in love with a married pastor
How do you ask a full-time preacher to leave a congregation and go preach somewhere else?

You never know what people will search for and as a result find your site. I didn’t expect these. Especially the cows. Definitely the cows.

Does your blog or website get traffic from abnormal search terms too?

Jonathan Howe serves as Director of Strategic Initiatives at LifeWay Christian Resources as well as the host and producer of Rainer on Leadership and SBC This Week. Jonathan writes weekly at ThomRainer.com on topics ranging from social media to websites and church communications. Connect with Jonathan on Twitter at @Jonathan_Howe.

Seven Traits of the Excellent Ministry Assistant

The days of the church secretary are waning.

This position is being replaced with a more contemporary and beneficial position called the ministry assistant. Such as the title communicates, clearly the person is about ministry more than the traditional secretarial skills.

So what does an excellent ministry assistant look like in the world of contemporary ministry? Allow me to share seven traits.

Good chemistry with the ministry leader. If the ministry assistant and the pastor, for example, don’t get along, the position will be of little use. But even more than getting along, the two have to respect one another and enjoy working with each other.
Keeps open lines of communications. This communication obviously works both ways. The pastor or other ministry leader must communicate his or her expectations clearly and consistently. The ministry assistant must always keep the leader informed and, as much as possible, avoid surprises.
Love of ministry. The ministry assistant is a part of the ministry, not an appendage to it. The assistant should see the role as vital to the health of the church or ministry organization.
Strong relational skills. The ministry assistant typically works with a number of different personalities each day. Assistants must be able to deal with both the pleasant and painful people who cross their path each day.
Thick skin. I have the best assistant on the planet. I would not ever get done what I get done without the incredible work of Amy Jordan. One of the toughest tasks she has is dealing with cantankerous people. Some of them want to criticize me. Some of them want to get to me through her, and don’t like it when she says no. Ministry is tough. Ministry has critics. The ministry assistant has to deal with them on a regular basis.
Proactive and flexible. No two days are alike in ministry. The demands come in waves and with great surprises. The ministry assistant must always be anticipating the next thing on the horizon. And the assistant must be flexible to meet the demands as they come.
Competent. You might have expected I would have listed this trait first. Certainly competency is important, but it is not the most important. If the ministry assistant has the first six traits, that person can likely be taught the skills and technology to be effective in the first quarter of the 21st century.

On a closing note, consider the virtual assistant as a great alternative. My assistant for Church Answers, Jana, lives in Atlanta and I live in Nashville. I have been absolutely amazed how well that relationship works. Of course, it helps that Jana is so good at what she does. I am sold on virtual assistants and the organization, BELAY, which does such an incredible job of matching assistants with leaders.

Ministry assistants are essential to so many ministries today. And whether they are on-site, like Amy, or virtual, like Jana, they make the difference between an adequate ministry and an excellent ministry.

Five Evangelism Realities We Must Face – Rainer on Leadership #358

Podcast Episode #358

SUBSCRIBE: iTunes • RSS • Stitcher • TuneIn Radio • Google Play

How much growth in growing churches is due to evangelism? Not as much as you would hope. We discuss effective evangelistic churches and more on this week’s episode.

Some highlights from today’s episode include:

Most growth in churches is from transfers, not conversions.
93-94% of churches are not effectively evangelistic.
Churches have lost their intentionality in evangelism.
Evangelism is falling off the radar for many churches.
A growing church is not necessarily an evangelistic church.
Churches that are intentional about evangelism are evangelistic churches.

The five evangelism realities we discuss are:

Growing churches are growing largely by transfer growth.
The number of effective evangelistic churches (EEC) is surprisingly stable.
Churches that are not in the EEC category are doing much worse evangelistically than in previous years.
Evangelism in the EEC churches is a clear priority.
There are clear and discernible patterns of action in EEC churches.


Episode Sponsors

Vanderbloemen Search Group is the premier pastor search firm dedicated to helping churches and ministries build great teams. Their Fall Lead Pastor and Executive Pastor Coaching Networks are now open for registration, and our very own Dr. Rainer will be speaking at the Fall Lead Pastor Coaching Network.

So if you’re a Lead Pastor or an Executive Pastor looking for peer roundtable coaching, check it out at vanderbloemen.com/coaching. It’s limited to 16 folks, so apply today before it fills up.

Midwestern Seminary, one of the fastest growing seminaries in North America, exists to train leaders For The Church. The local church is God’s “Plan A” for the proclamation of the gospel, and there is no Plan B. And this is Midwestern’s vision and heartbeat—equipping pastors and other ministry leaders who are called to expand God’s mission in the world through the local church. At Midwestern Seminary: they train leaders ‘For The Church.’

Visit them online at MBTS.edu and start your ministry training today.

Feedback

If you have a question you would like answered on the show, fill out the form on the podcast page here at ThomRainer.com. If we use your question, you’ll receive a free copy of Who Moved My Pulpit?

Resources Mentioned in Today’s Podcast

ChurchMortician.com
EvangelismRenewal.com
Autopsy of a Deceased Church

Six Traits of a Church Disrupter

He is almost in every church.

In fact, the “he” may be a “she,” but I’ll use the masculine pronoun for simplicity.

He is the church disrupter. Unlike church bullies, the disrupter rarely attacks leaders directly. He is good about stirring up dissension, but he seems to always feel like “God led me to do it.” He can have a gregarious and pleasant personality (unlike the typical church bully), and can thus attract a following for a season.

The disrupter is just that. He disrupts the unity of the church. He disrupts the outward focus of the church. And he disrupts the plans of church leadership. So what are some key traits to watch in church disrupters? Here are six:

He often seeks positions in the church so he can get attention. So be wary if he asks to lead the student group or the praise team or become chairman of the finance committee. He loves to exert his negative influence through key and visible positions.
He often votes “no” in business meetings. Again, this tactic is yet another attempt to get attention.
He loves to say, “People are saying . . .” He wants you to think his issue is more widespread than it really is. Another approach is “If we had a secret ballot vote, there would be a lot more dissenters.”
He tries to get followers at the church for his cause of the moment. That is another reason he seeks positions of influence in the church.
He often assures the pastor and other church leaders how much he loves them and supports them. And then he goes and stabs them in the back.
He loves to use “facts’ loosely for his case or cause. Accuracy is neither required nor expected.

So how should pastors and other church leaders address the problem of church disrupters? Allow me to suggest a few ideas.

Determine you will love them as Christ loves you and them. It’s tough, but it can be done in Christ’s strength.
Pray for them. Seriously.
Be on the watch for them. They can be manipulative and deceptive; they can cause chaos before you see it coming.
Get other leaders to help you address the disrupters and their disruption. But, be aware, they will be shocked you perceive them that way.
As soon as possible, get them out of key leadership positions. They are a problem now, but they can become toxic later.

I have my theories on why church disrupters act the way they do, but that is a topic for another post. In the meantime, be wary of church disrupters. But love them and pray for them anyway.

That is the way Christ would respond.